Integration of the Roma into Swedish society through the medium of primary education : the case of Gothenburg

Abstract

The aim of this study is to find out whether the Swedish primary education system reflects an effort to integrate the Roma into Swedish society from a human rights perspective. This study compares the situation in law, as stated in the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, the Law on National Minorities and National Minority Languages (a Swedish national legislation), and the Swedish national policy on integration and multiculturalism, with the situation of education of the Roma in the city of Gothenburg. This study investigates two things. The first, is whether municipal officials, school principals and teachers, consider education as a medium of integration of minority communities into mainstream society. And the second is whether these officials, principals and teachers look at the education of the Roma from a human rights perspective. The scholarly work on the topics of integration of minorities, multiculturalism, segregation, and the role of education and the native language in the process of integration, forms the theoretical background of this study. The data used in this study has been collected in two ways, through documents and interviews. Interviews have been conducted with municipal officials, school principals and teachers. The methodology used to analyse the data is qualitative thematic analysis. This study shows that in law, there can be seen a clear effort to integrate the Roma into Swedish society from a human rights perspective. However, the ground reality does not in all cases live up to this legal standard, and there are a variety of reasons why the situation is thus. Effectively, the result is that a law having a lot of potential is practically rendered of little use, thereby creating a great discrepancy between human rights in law and human rights in practice.